


Give me what I want

by sternflammenden



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Knifeplay, M/M, Non Consensual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-27
Updated: 2012-04-27
Packaged: 2017-11-04 09:41:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/392412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sternflammenden/pseuds/sternflammenden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the asoiafkinkmeme on LiveJournal. </p><p>Prompt:  <i>Robb/Theon, Roose Bolton/Theon<br/>Theon has abusive sex with Roose Bolton to keep him loyal to Robb.</i></p><p>This plays hard and fast with locations.  Roose is at the Dreadfort way before he is in canon.   He’ll go to the Twins after he toys with poor Theon for the Tully/Frey nuptuals.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Give me what I want

He closes his eyes most of the time, and pretends that he’s back at Winterfell. It’s not difficult, really. Theon’s become such a master of self-deception that he swears that he can hear the clang of swords in the yard, children calling to each other, the bustle of life, life, life. Because in the Dreadfort, there’s only silence. Certainly, if you venture below, there are sounds, much less pleasant than those in his adopted home. There is weeping, and sometimes bargaining, begging, pleading, and every once in a while, when the time is right, there is screaming. Then death. But it’s all locked away, all ordered as it should be. 

And now that his lord has struck a bargain, he no longer has to worry about any of that. 

“Give me what I want,” Roose Bolton had said, a cold hand laid on Theon’s grimy cheek, and he had nodded. He had acquiesced although he had no idea what was meant by that phrase, and had not taken the time to ponder the implications. And now, he wishes that he had, even though it would not have made much difference. “Things will be different,” he had continued, his soft voice soothing in comparison to the harsh screech of hinges, the dirty laughter from Bolton men clustered in corridors, the rustling of rats in the straw of Theon’s cell. “Things will be better.” 

Bolton had smiled, although it had looked more like the baring of teeth. And Theon had smiled back, albeit weakly, his face aching from the effort of even that. 

And he’d been brought above stairs, he’d been given back his finery, slightly soiled, slightly tattered, had been led to a steaming bath where servants soothed his aching muscles and a silent maester had treated what wounds that the Bastard had been permitted to inflict. There had been wine and food, more than he’d seen since Winterfell, and that night, he had crammed his mouth with both until he was ill. 

He knew that there would be a price. 

_Then again_ , Theon thought, smiling again, his expression unconsciously just as cold as Bolton’s had been, _what does it matter? I am already damned._

He slept well, on a featherbed with pillows and blankets to cushion his aching joints, the only sound now that of the wind, and the hollow quiet of the castle’s lonely corridors. 

*

He’s kept waiting, and although inside Theon twitches and clenches, he is calm, lying still in the furs that he had bedded with, his breathing slow and easy. It’s been weeks and already he’s healing, the bandages on his hands checked and changed daily, his rest undisturbed, his meals bountiful. No longer do the bones jut too close to the surface, no longer can he easily make out the skull beneath the skin. When he questions the servants as to what is to be done with him, they give no true answer, only vagueries about his lordship’s absence and how nothing can be decided without Lord Bolton’s consent. He does not see the Bastard, Heir of the Dreadfort, Ramsay, or whatever he styles himself. 

Of that, he is glad. 

*

Roose Bolton brings a bride with him from the Twins, a fat child in pink lace. Theon only sees her from a distance but he finds her absurd, utterly out of place in the Dreadfort in her childish finery, her high voice echoing through the silence as she eagerly clutches her husband’s arm. He is left to his own devices and finds that he is bored. Theon would not return to the dungeons for anything, but he’s idle and such thoughts lead to imaginings that are likely worse than reality. He wonders if Bolton will teach his new wife the old ways, if her plump fingers will wield a knife, if her sweet features will grow harsh and fearsome in low light, if her young voice will question and taunt. 

He thinks not. 

One night, he is sent for, and as the guards lead him to Roose Bolton’s rooms, he realizes that he is not afraid any longer. He is, rather, cautious, yet hopefully naive. 

*

Bolton tells him of the war, and Theon is surprised. While he does not ask outright, he gleans signs of his family’s failings from the edge to Bolton’s well-chosen words, and when he thinks _family_ , even though his mind is there, it is not to the Iron Islands that his thoughts return, but to Winterfell, to sisters who taunt and clash but still hold each other dear, to brothers so alike and yet so strange, their auburn hair like fire as they cluster together in his memory. And he wonders what has become of Robb, and then thoughts stray to moments that he’d hidden deep, moments that he would rather no one know of save himself, save his brother. And yet not his brother, for brothers do not do the things that they did in dark rooms, in stolen moments of solitude. 

It is some time before he realizes that Roose Bolton is no longer speaking, not that he could discern much above the popping of the fire. He is merely staring at Theon as if he is some curiosity, his features arranged in a smile as artificial as Theon’s ever seen. 

“It might interest you to know that I bring tidings of the king,” he says then, pointedly enunciating the last word as if he finds it ludicrous. 

“My father?” Theon replies thickly, his voice coarse from lack of use, and blurred by the wine that he’s been drinking rather mindlessly, glass after glass. His belly is full of Arbor Red and not much else, and there’s a heaviness to his limbs that he’d rather not feel, but it’s far too late for such regrets. 

“Balon Greyjoy?” Roose Bolton smirks then. “Hardly. I speak of the King in the North.”

“Robb,” he whispers then, his eyes wandering elsewhere, his face tensing, although he tries to stop it. 

“Robb Stark,” Bolton says then, and he reaches across the table, his hand stilling Theon’s which has begun to tremble. “Your king, or at least until you burnt his holdfast.” Although his voice is calm, there is a cruel gleam in his eyes, what looks to be amusement. “It seems that he too has taken a wife.”

“A Frey, as well, if I remember,” Theon says then, and Roose Bolton smiles. 

“Some girl from the Crag. Lord Walder was quite put out over that, I assure you.” 

Theon shakes his head, his mouth open, frozen. 

“There will be consequences. A pity.”

The implication hangs in the air between them, weighted, menacing. 

“Is there aught I can do then, my lord?” he asks, head bowed. 

Bolton nods then, thoughtful. “I could be persuaded to…speak for him,” he says, and he presses Theon’s hand slightly. “And perhaps, to speak for you.” 

*

He doesn’t protest when Bolton leads him out of the solar. He’s far too drunk to care really, and if he weren’t drunk he might rage, might feel something at least, more than the deadened sense of finality that fills him. Theon knows, of course, that Robb Stark isn’t his, that what they’d done had been nothing more than childish experimentation, but there is a part of him that entertains certain thoughts, thoughts brought to the surface by what his life has become. 

Despite Ramsay’s mistreatment, there were times, rare though they were, when his captor’s touch had not been harsh, had almost been tender, and it was then that he’d shut out the world that he knew, and imagined himself home again, his brother’s mouth finding purchase on his body, his hands grasping him when they’d dared to couple, to lie together as Theon had with whores, as Robb had with no one until his brother had taken him in hand. While he’d put the idea into Robb’s head, it hadn’t taken much when it all came down to it. 

And he’ll do much the same now, for he’s been trained. He’s been broken. 

“They say he says your name in his sleep,” Bolton says, his hands slowly undoing Theon’s breeches, the lacings on his tunic. His touch is clinical and although he is relaxed, his fingers grip Theon as though they are steel. 

Theon closes his eyes. “What would you have of me, my lord,” he whispers then, knowing and fearing the answer, but understanding that it is a foregone conclusion at this point. 

“Give me what I want,” Bolton says softly in his ear. “And perhaps, I will give you what you want.” 

“What of your wife?” Theon dares to ask, thinking of Walda’s tear-streaked face were she to discover this infidelity. 

Bolton turns him over and grips his waist, bruising his flesh as he digs his fingers into Theon’s body. His breath is surprisingly hot in Theon’s ear as he replies. “She is not your concern, Greyjoy.” And he realizes that it is not his place to question Lord Bolton, that he must obey, that he must accept, that he must do as he is bid. 

_What do I want?_ he thinks, and he knows the answer. It pains him how quick it comes, how easily he can imagine worming his way into the king’s graces again, Bolton advocating his innocence, foisting blame on some other lordling, perhaps on his mad dog of a son. It might be that easy.

But it’s never so simple, and he knows that words are just that, pretty things spoken and left to die in the air. And he recalls the glint in Bolton’s eyes when he spoke of Robb’s marriage, the hard words, the tacit threat, and he knows that he’ll do this, he’ll do anything. After all, hasn’t he done worse? 

And he can close his eyes. 

And close them he does, gasping as Bolton takes him suddenly, all of his courtly courtesies and practiced subtleties falling away behind closed doors. He is unprepared for such an action and gasps, cries out from the pain, and as his lord thrusts roughly against him, he thinks of other times, other nights that are not so far off now, and can be again. 

When Bolton bites down on his shoulder, letting blood as he comes, Theon pays it no mind. When he shoves Theon to the floor, all sprawling limbs and half-frustrated desire, he stands over him, grim approval on his face. Theon, eyes open, peers upward, and when the illusion is broken, he despises himself for being so used. 

He is another man’s whore now. 

*

One night, Roose Bolton speaks to him. Usually Theon is brought in darkness to his rooms, and things progress in silence, and even when his blood flows from what happens there, he makes no noise. But tonight is different. Theon sits on the bed’s edge, fully-clad, hands clenched in anticipation, when Bolton sits insinuatingly close. As he leans toward Theon, he wishes for nothing more than to pull back, but he will not give his lord that satisfaction. Instead, he meets his gaze with heated eyes. 

“Tomorrow I depart for a wedding,” Bolton says, as though it were nothing, but to Theon, it is everything. 

“What has this to do with me, my lord?” he replies. He has learned his place and such courtesies are important. 

“Perhaps I shall meet with the king,” Bolton says with a half-smile. “Perhaps I shall speak for you then.” He runs a finger along Theon’s cheek, bringing it next to his mouth. “And perhaps I shall speak for him.”

“Then I have pleased you?” Theon asks, the note of desperation in his voice sickening him, even though it is necessary. 

Bolton chuckles as he hooks his finger in Theon’s doublet, easing it open, maddeningly slowly. “As much as you could have, I suppose.” 

And when he brandishes a blade, slim and slight, barely there, Theon shudders but stills himself, knowing what it’s for, what has been done with it, and although Bolton’s hands are gleaming white in the dimness of the room, he can imagine them running scarlet with gouts of freshly shed blood, his face as hard and triumphant as it is when he has brought Theon to his knees. And he does not shirk when it’s brought to his neck, just barely brushing the soft flesh of his throat.

“He was yours, wasn’t he?” Bolton says softly, sliding the knife against a vein, pressing it slightly, just enough to break the skin, enough to bring just a bit of blood to the surface, and it is riotous against Theon’s winter paleness, against the steel of the blade. He feels his gorge hitch as a single drop trickles down his chest. 

“Wasn’t he?” Bolton repeats, pressing harder, but not enough to really wound. 

“Yes,” Theon whispers, “Yes, my lord.” And he thinks, but will not say to this man, _He was mine, I was his, and we were each other’s._ For Bolton, with his child bride, his cold eyes, his lack of remorse, would never understand that. 

And after the knife is cast aside, and he is alone again, examining the wounds and the bruises, he thinks that after all, it’s all been worth it. In the end, it will be worth it. 

Things will be as they were again.


End file.
